[7]: 9  The effort was spearheaded by local landowner Richard Lyman following a trip to Japan, where he learned of a project to lay underwater power cables between the country's islands.

Upon returning to Hawaii, Lyman promoted geothermal power generation in Puna, distributed to Oahu and other population centers by underwater cables, as a way of developing the economy.

[8]: 14–15  The well was occasionally allowed to discharge gas and fluid from the borehole, which created a loud noise and release pollutants into the air.

By 1976, three subdivisions nearby had been established and were beginning to house residents, including twelve families who lived within one mile of the well.

However, families continued to build and move into the nearby subdivisions, resulting in several attempts and a failed lawsuit to stop the noise and pollution.

In April 1989, county officials raised concerns about the condition of the facility following a minor blowout and considered reviewing and possibly revoking the operating permit for the site.

[11][12] In 2016 the plant's owners were found to be in violation of U.S. Environmental Protection Agency standards regarding hydrogen sulfide releases and was fined $76,500 for two incidents in 2013.

[13][14] Additional concerns and opposition to the plant were raised by Native Hawaiians, who viewed all forms of volcanic activity as demigod Pele manifestations.

It was encountered after drilling through a 240 ft (73 m) layer of diorite igneous rock, which suggested to researchers that the magma had chemically separated as it dwelled for a long period.

[15][16][17][18] As quoted in Nature, the team said it was possibly the first time that "the actual process of differentiation of continental-type rock from primitive ocean basalt has been observed in situ".

[7]: 9  In 2015, HELCO announced that Ormat was the winner of a bid to add 25 MW of geothermal generating capacity in the Puna district.

[20] On May 3, 2018 earth fissures opened inside and around the Leilani Estates subdivision near the PGV plant, following hundreds of earthquakes over the first two days of May.

Concerns of possible toxic hydrogen sulfide gas releases and explosions at the geothermal power facility led to preemptive equipment shutdowns and inventorying its stockpile of highly-flammable pentane.

Earthquake frequency began increasing and the first cracks appeared in Leilani Estates on May 1–2; the plant was taken off-line approximately three hours after it received the first report that lava had begun to flow on May 3.

One well, KS-14, possibly super-heated from close proximity to magma, could not be quenched and was filled with drilling mud in an attempt to stabilize it.

[31][32] On May 30 a substation and a warehouse containing a drilling rig were overrun and destroyed by molten rock, cutting the main access road to the facility.

[44] As of 2008, the five active production wells had a surface elevation of 620 ft (190 m) above sea level and produce a mixture of steam and brine.

Andrea Gill of the Hawaii Department of Business, Economic Development, and Tourism—on behalf of a working group established to consider direct uses of the geothermal energy at PGV and its vicinity—outlined potential direct uses of the fluids as well as shallow groundwater wells in its vicinity, including fruit and macadamia nut dehydration, aquaculture and greenhouse heating, pasteurization and sterilization, geothermal/health spas, and geothermal heat pumps.

[46] In 2005, after a drill hit an uncommonly-observed type of magma, researchers and PGV expressed a desire to turn the borehole into an observatory for scientific studies.